Much to the dismay of Nashville Predators' head coach Barry Trotz, the bounces and whistles did not go in his team's favor on Saturday afternoon in a 4-2 loss. Certainly I'm not one to deny the fact that a few of those hurt the Predators (ex. the puck hitting the linesman in Game #1 and then the Predators' disallowed goal in Game #2). However, I don't believe the Predators should have won those first two games even if the bounces had gone their way. I truly feel that the Red Wings were the better team in the first two games and deserved the win and would have probably won without the bad breaks to the Predators.
It was certainly a big game by goaltender Dominik Hasek, who acted like his crazy self. He was flopping, poking at pucks, and leaving his crease way too much for my liking. However, he got the job done and really was the difference in the first period when the Predators were firing shots off left and right.
The first goal of the game came from an unlikely source, Darren McCarty. It was his first goal with Detroit since the 2003-2004 season (Detroit had to buy him out following the lockout) and it's just an amazing story to see him deal with his demons and work his way back to Detroit.
Nicklas Lidstrom followed that up with a shot from the blue line on the power play to give Detroit a 2-0 lead. Less than two minutes later, Nashville scored twice in a span of 11 seconds to tie the game up at two apiece. Wings head coach Mike Babcock quickly called a timeout to settle his team down, which paid off as Kris Draper scored two and a half minutes after the timeout. Tomas Holmstrom sealed the deal with a goal halfway through the third period.